Let's review; in the past few weeks we have learned that internet companies have a conscience, have standards, have a backbone, and even the most reluctant can be motivated to act when confronted with horrific tragedy. We have also been reminded that these companies have a scary amount of power. But lastly, and maybe most importantly, even all this cannot stop cyberhate completely.
For years providers have been periodically purging hate sites from their services. Many sites simply re-emerge on another service. Until now.
Stormfront, the longest extant hate website on the internet, was taken offline two weeks ago. A casualty of the standards enforcement awakening. Last Friday, that website's owner announced to his faithful audience that although offline, the website could still be accessed and used by those technologically durable enough to work the coding magic necessary. In other words, although greatly diminished and almost dormant, Stormfront, like Voldemort, is still alive. In fact Stormfront, which started as a dial-up bulletin board in 1985, is now surviving as a 2017 version of dial-up network. Don Black, Stormfront's creator and operator, has always played the long game. He will strive to keep Stormfront alive until he can reconnect it to the internet and use that online energy to re-infuse the site with life.
Other websites are not operated as tactically.
Daily Stormer, the now exiled, archetypal pariah hate website, is run by Andrew Anglin and a small band of hangers-on. Anglin is obsessed with attention and will say anything to get it, including calls for physical attacks and glorifying death. However, once dropped by U.S. providers, his shortsightedness has even left his site unpalatable to internet providers in Russia and Albania. In a pathetic display of neediness Anglin recently posted a 92 page PDF for his followers. Who is going to read a 92 page online doc?
First amendment fundamentalists need not be too alarmed. Many of the refugee hate websites re-emerged one way or the other. Those who knew they wouldn't uploaded their content to an extremist created library of hate. Equally, archive.org retains huge volumes of hateful content, and although not archive.orgs objective, that content remains ready to reuse.
Our darkest places already exist and wait, just hoping the internet will remain their path into the light.
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